Military and law enforcement personnel are often involved in peacekeeping, humanitarian, and counter-terrorism missions. For example, law enforcement personnel may be involved in crowd control and disbursement operations during a riot. Sometimes these personnel may need to release an obscurant into the surrounding areas in order to decrease visibility conditions. Obscurants are particles suspended in the air that block or weaken the transmission of a particular part or parts of the electromagnetic spectrum such as, for example, visible and infrared radiation, or microwaves. Obscurants include, but are not limited to, fog, smoke, and dust.
During military operations, an unfriendly force or enemy's surveillance and weapon systems may utilize visual or infrared sensors in order to view forces or other targets. Thus, obscurants may be used to conceal the location of these forces or other targets from the enemy. Indeed, obscurants play an important role in military operations, as they provide protection of personnel and equipment from the sensors of unfriendly forces. However, an obscurant conceals forces and targets not only from unfriendly forces, but also from view of everyone else as well. In other words, an obscurant will conceal objects from friendly forces as well, which may be disadvantageous in some situations. Thus, there exists a continuing need in the art to improve obscurant systems such that a target is concealed from hostile forces, but may also be viewed by friendly forces as well. Additionally, it should also be appreciated that there is also a continuing need in the art to improve obscurant systems for attenuating an laser weapons as well.